


When The Time Is Right

by CaptainWeasley



Category: The Prince of Pennsylvania (1988)
Genre: Coming Out, Mention of Aids crisis, Non-binary character, Other, Rupert is non-binary, Self-Discovery, also Rupert is a lesbian, but if it wasn't you're just gonna have to suspend your disbelief, i also don't know if usage of singular they/them was common in this time period, i don't know whether the term non-binary was a thing in the late 80's/early 90's, i kid you not the character is called "biker girl" on imdb, that's why i left it out of the story, they/them rupert marshetta is non-negotiable
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-02
Updated: 2021-03-02
Packaged: 2021-03-14 09:13:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,309
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29789697
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainWeasley/pseuds/CaptainWeasley
Summary: After Rupert leaves his home town, he goes on a journey of self-discovery to find out who he actually is—and who he wants to be.
Relationships: Rupert Marshetta/Biker Girl, Rupert Marshetta/Original Female Character
Kudos: 1





	When The Time Is Right

**Author's Note:**

> Since I don't want anyone clowning on me in the comments, here's a little disclaimer: I am a queer author writing about queer characters. Queer is a wonderful word and if you don't like it please don't read this.

The ride to Pittsburgh feels strange. Like Rupert is almost free but not, like freedom is right there in front of him and he cannot reach it, and this unreachable freedom also seems fleeting, almost like a trap. He holds onto Joan, both excited and terrified to learn what his life is going to be like from here on out.

**

Rupert feels like he's not himself. He feels alienated from reality, and yet he cannot understand what he must do to feel _present_ , to feel at home in his own body. He does not like to look at himself. He does not like Joan looking at him when they're in bed together.

It's easy, being with her. She's funny and gentle and has an inner strength Rupert admires. They don't demand anything of each other. There's no talk about love, or commitment, or long-term plans, they just like being with each other, that's all it has to be. Rupert is glad that this is what they have, that they're friends. He doesn't feel capable of falling in love again, not while still dreaming of Carla, not while thinking of her in the dead of night, Joan's warm, steady breaths on his skin. He tells Joan about her, what he loves about her, what Carla means to him. Joan tells him about a girl named Lilly, a girl who broke her heart.

Rupert and Joan are both working jobs that they hate in Pittsburgh but at least they can buy food and have a roof over their heads, so Rupert doesn't want to complain. After all, it could be worse: he remembers working in the mine well enough.

**

After a few months of this, Rupert feels stuck. He's in a rut and feels like something's not quite right. Every week is the same: work, sex with Joan some evenings, on the weekends, they meet their new biker friends, get drunk and smoke weed. Sometimes, they go to a party. Sometimes, they go to watch a movie. None of this is bad, per se, some of it is even very enjoyable, but Rupert feels like there's something missing, like there's something inside him that's holding him back from ever being truly happy.

He still thinks of Carla, sometimes, the way she used to make him feel—he had been happy, he thinks, fleetingly happy in her arms, had felt a connection to her he had barely understood and for which he still has no words, even now. He had been more present, more himself, more real in her arms than anywhere else. The loss of her tugs at his heart from time to time, but the wound is healing, the pain isn't as excruciating now as it had been. Sometimes, all he wants is to see her again, to try again, to be the partner Carla deserves this time around. Sometimes, he wonders whether that would be a step in the wrong direction, a step into his own past.

He never actually contacts her.

Instead, Rupert starts making art: little pencil scribbles at first, nonsensical, on the edges of bills and phone books, then he buys paint and paintbrushes and smooth white paper, and starts working with colors. It becomes an obsession after a while: he adds two or three pieces to his stack of paintings every day, without ever looking through his old ones. And yet he's hesitant to throw the pictures out after completing them. So they just keep piling up, and eventually Rupert buys a binder to keep them in.

He doesn't even like the things he makes: he never manages to put his ideas onto the paper the way he imagines the finished works in his mind. It's frustrating and yet he still paints every day, almost religiously.

He tries to capture Carla with the strokes of his brush, tries to bind her spirit to one of the pages, but she is fickle, like water trickling over his skin. His recreations of her are feeble and each only tells a fraction of a much bigger truth, like looking at a single blade of grass while trying to understand the Earth's ecosystem. Rupert is aware of the futility of it all, and yet he keeps at it stubbornly, almost defiantly.

After a while, he starts drawing another person: himself. Only, on the pages, he is shattered, he is fragmented, he is nonsensical. Rupert is incapable of drawing himself as a whole, as a single body, as a unit. These self-portraits are bordering on depicting violence, their color schemes are always different to that of his pictures of Carla, darker, starker, even when he's working with the exact same palette for both on a given day.

When Joan says he should think about getting into art professionally, Rupert laughs and shakes his head. He doesn't think anyone would want to see hundreds of pictures of the same two things over and over again, which he is incapable of depicting truthfully in the first place. No, he's fine just doing this in his spare time.

**

One day, Rupert looks into the mirror and wants to paint himself. Wants to drag his paint brushes all over his face until it's as colorful, as stark, as expressive as his artwork. He knows better than to actually attempt it and risk his health in the process, but the idea lingers.

It bugs him for weeks, then he buys finger paint intended for toddlers that won't damage his skin. That evening, he borrows bobby pins from Joan to keep his hair out of his face and then he dips a finger into the red paint, drags it over his face: a line from his eyebrow down to his jaw. It takes a while until his whole face is covered in color. The end result is not quite what he was hoping for, but that is a feeling Rupert is used to by now.

He asks Joan what she thinks, and Joan tells him that if she saw this sort of thing on an album cover, she would probably buy the album. Rupert laughs at the unexpected compliment.

"Can I put make-up on you tomorrow?"

Rupert shrugs and says, "Sure."

**

The feeling of Joan's soft brush strokes on Rupert's skin is weirdly soothing. It's a gentle way of being taken care of that makes his stomach feel all tingly. He wonders what he's going to look like: he has never tried putting make-up on himself, not even as a form of rebellion against his family. In hindsight, he wonders why he never used make-up as a teenager, it would have angered his parents so much.

The idea had never occurred to him, somehow.

When Joan is finished, Rupert doesn't want her to be. He wants to keep sitting there with his eyes closed, reveling in the feeling of her gently touching his face. However, he makes himself open his eyes, turn around and look in the mirror.

He stares at himself. He's not sure what he's feeling; inside him, everything seems muted, dimmed. Looking at his reflection is like looking at his self-portraits: Rupert is fragmented, shattered, nonsensical. The reflection is not him. Or rather, it is a part of him that seems to belong to a different version of himself, like glimpsing through the fabric of time and space into another reality.

His other self is pretty. There's no other word for it. His other self is colorful and sparkly and glittery and pretty.

Rupert watches his other self cry in the mirror. He can see Joan comforting that stranger, can see her hug him, and yet her touch seems to never actually reach his own skin. 

**

"What is that even, a man?" Rupert asks, takes a drag of his joint. "What is that?"

"Good question," Joan sighs.

They're looking at the stars, the warm air of this summer's night only stirred by a light breeze. Rupert can feel a stone digging into his back, even through the blanket. It's a little annoying but not annoying enough to warrant getting up.

"Everybody always told me I was supposed to be a man but I don't even know what that means. Maybe it doesn't mean anything."

By _everybody_ , he mostly means his father.

He takes another drag. Joan moves closer to him, holds out her hand and he gives her the joint. She's beautiful, smoking in the moonlight: her skin seems like ivory, every shadow and curve is more pronounced, her dark nipples are standing out against the paleness of her body.

"I think it's like, you want to be a man, you are one. That's what it means."

"I don't want to be a man."

Rupert says this before he fully understands it, and even after understanding it he doesn't know what to do with this new knowledge. It's true: he doesn't want to be a man. But what else is there? What else could there be? He's pretty sure he doesn't want to be a woman, either. He just wants to be whole. He just wants to be himself.

Joan just shrugs, drowsy from the combination of weed and sex and stargazing.

"Then you probably aren't one."

**

Joan meets a girl. Rupert watches her fall in love, and he's happy for her, truly. Harriet looks all prim and proper, but she has a quick tongue and a witty sense of humor and when she sits behind Joan on her bike, it feels like she belongs there, her arms around Joan's waist.

Joan and Rupert stop having sex. It's a loss that Rupert had anticipated but it still hits him. He misses their easy companionship, their late-night conversations, he misses being touched. Connecting with people doesn't come very easy to him, he often feels like he cannot share his true soul with the people he meets, and he doesn't want to sleep with anyone who doesn't understand him. He kisses a few girls at parties, and they're all lovely, but he doesn't feel a true connection with any of them.

More than ever, he feels alienated from himself. He still dreams of that other self he saw in the mirror, and invariably wakes up with a longing for—something. For connection. For understanding. For truth. For something else he can't define.

He paints his face in front of the mirror sometimes, always without Joan now. He yearns to find the answers in altering himself, yet they aren't forthcoming. The only thing he grows more and more sure of is that he is not a man.

**

Surprisingly, Harriet is the one who makes a suggestion that seems obvious, and yet the idea hadn't occurred to Rupert: to meet other people like him. To ask them about their experiences.

There's a group of political activists in Pittsburgh who are fighting for queer liberation. Rupert is nervous about going to one of their meetings, he's not a very political person, much less an activist. Yet he wants to talk to people who might understand, who might help him understand himself.

When he tells Joan that he's nervous about going alone, she hugs him and says that Harriet and her will go with him if he wants. He does want that.

It feels intimidating at first, talking to people who are so much further along in their journey to self-discovery. Then, it feels comforting.

Rupert starts going to almost every meeting, even without Joan and Harriet. He draws banners and protest signs for their marches, and he starts painting people other than Carla and himself. That particular development comes as a surprise to himself—when one of the founders of the group dies of AIDS and his family doesn't permit his boyfriend to keep any of his things as mementos, Rupert buys a canvas and paints Hector the way he saw him: bright, loud, kind. He gives Lee the painting as a gift, and Lee cries and Rupert holds him and after that, people start asking Rupert to paint their loved ones, too.

AIDS is like a dark shadow over everything and everyone in Rupert's new friend group. Every week, there are new reports of deaths, of tragedy, of families who reject their children, who refuse to bury them; partners who are without legal rights, without any way to say good-bye, without closure. They organize a lot of funerals for people who would otherwise be denied any dignity even in death, and Rupert paints, paints, paints.

And yet, even despite these horrors, Rupert is glad to be there.

He makes a friend who everyone just calls Miss Daisy, a little old lady who usually brings home-made cookies to the meetings and knits socks while the others talk, never saying much herself. Rupert feels drawn to her quiet presence, feels a kinship towards her even before really knowing her.

And when Rupert and her do get to talking, their friendship is immediate and wonderful. Rupert feels free with her, free to make stupid jokes and pull weird faces and be himself.

**

They're in Miss Daisy's kitchen, and she is showing Rupert how to bake cookies—Rupert was never taught many culinary skills at home. When the cookies are in the oven, the two of them sit down to talk.

Finally, Rupert asks the question that's been plaguing him.

"How do I figure out who I am?"

Miss Daisy looks at him kindly.

"What do you mean, darling?"

Rupert shakes his head slightly.

"I just—I don't know what I'm supposed to be. I don't want to be a man and I don't want to be a woman, either."

There's a smile on her face when she pats his hand.

"But that's wonderful, deary. Why are you making such a face about it?"

Rupert runs his free hand through his hair.

"I feel like I don't make any sense. Like I don't know myself at all... How did you figure out who you wanted to be?"

Miss Daisy laughs her deep, throaty laugh.

"Oh, it was real easy for me. I always knew I was a Miss, just like I always knew the sky was blue. But I've met plenty of people who needed time to figure things out. Don't pressure yourself to find the answer, it'll come to you when it's supposed to come to you. Always does."

Rupert sighs.

"Are you sure? I feel like every day I know less and less about myself."

Miss Daisy pats his hand again.

"Not knowing something is not a bad thing. Life would be rather dull if we always had all the answers."

She looks at Rupert, and smiles at his unhappy expression.

"Darling, you're still so very young. You'll find yourself one day, don't you worry. But if it's really bothering you so much, throw _man_ and _woman_ and all that tedious stuff out the window and just focus on what makes you happy. That's the only thing that really matters in life."

She winks at him, and then the cookies are done. 

**

With Miss Daisy's help, Rupert tries to find out what sort of self-expression makes him happy.

He likes glittery make-up and pink lipstick, but not all the time.

He likes wearing dresses sometimes.

He likes colorful clothes, no matter whether they're from the "men's" or the "women's" section of a store.

He likes styling his hair in a way that he knows would make his parents angry if they saw it.

He likes being in full biker gear.

He likes painting his nails.

He likes wearing huge punk boots.

The list grows and grows. After a while, Rupert is sure: he's neither a man nor a woman. And that's fine.

**

When Jay joins their group, Rupert finally meets someone who feels like he does. The funny thing is, he doesn't even particularly like Jay at first, but they do understand each other, and end up talking about gender a lot. Jay doesn't want anyone to call them he or she, which makes Rupert think about what he wants to be called. Jay says they fall in love with people regardless of gender, which makes Rupert reflect on who he tends to be attracted to, and why. Jay takes hormones to change their body—Rupert wonders whether he might want to do that, as well.

It takes a little courage to ask his friends to help him with the pronoun issue, but they're all happy to try things out with him. Rupert goes by "she" for a week and doesn't think it fits. After that, Rupert gives "they" a try. And this, this does stick, because it feels true to Rupert's soul.

The difficult thing is that in mainstream society, Rupert's identity doesn't exist. They're not out at work, they're not out with their family, every legal document has an ugly little M on it. Rupert doesn't feel up to explaining something intimate and personal to strangers over and over again, so they don't. The more secure they become in their identity, however, the more it starts to bother them. Finally, Rupert asks their boss not to call them a man—they don't even mention pronouns—and the next day, they get their two weeks notice.

Rupert isn't even surprised. They've heard so many stories by now about people losing their jobs due to discrimination and fear of AIDS. There's a strange sort of relief in being rid of the job they hated, but that doesn't outweigh the worry that they won't find another one. Joan has been talking about moving in with Harriet, and Rupert offered to get a place for themself so that Joan can stay in the apartment they're both currently living in.

However, the issue is solved more quickly than Rupert would have expected: Miss Daisy knows the owner of an art supply store, and calls to tell her about "a young darling who needs a job." Rupert grins behind Miss Daisy's back when they hear her say this on the phone: the way the old lady says _darling_ is somehow one of the things that feels more true to their gender than anything else.

A short time later, Rupert starts working at the store. They love the atmosphere of the place: it's vibrant and welcoming and every one of their colleagues is really nice. It's a small team, just five people and the owner. Rupert doesn't feel out of place there at all, even with their colorful clothes and their weird hair and their painted nails and their punk boots. 

**

Talking to Jay makes Rupert think about how much they love women. There's something beautiful in every single woman Rupert has ever met, Rupert is sure of this. And the way they see women is very different from the way men view women. Rupert grew up around men, was forced to change in male locker rooms at school, worked in the mine with their father for months, was privy to a lot of conversations about women. None of the men they know ever talked about women's inner beauty, about their strength, about their voices, about their laughs. None of them ever talked about being in a woman's arms and feeling safe there, or about seeing a woman smile after making her come, the vulnerability in her eyes, the trust, the intimacy. None of them ever seemed to want to help any woman reach her full potential, to support her work and her dreams, to be a partner in the true sense of the word.

No, Rupert feels very strongly that the way they themself love women has nothing in common with the way men love women.

One night, Rupert mentions this observation to Joan and Harriet. Joan just nods and says that no man ever took care of her the way Rupert used to take care of her, even the men who told her they loved her, and Harriet takes a deep drag from their shared joint.

"I think you might be a lesbian," she says, completely serious.

Rupert laughs at first, because that's not a label they would have thought to apply to themself, but Harriet waves their objections away.

"There've been a lot of discussions about this among lesbians, you know—whether our attraction to women can be compared to men's attraction to women. Personally, I don't think so. It's like you said... Our love encompasses so much more than their love. The way men are conditioned to see women in our society prevents them from truly loving them. That's why lesbian love for women will by its nature always be deeper as long as men don't make an effort to free themselves of the shackles placed on them by the patriarchy."

Rupert isn't sure they completely follow: it's late and they've smoked a lot already. However, one thing they feel confident about is the fact that they've done a lot of work to free themself of the shackles that used to bind them—maybe the term lesbian is more fitting than they first thought.

**

Rupert falls in love with one of their colleagues. Desperately, deeply, head-spinningly in love.

Leah is a little older than them, in her early thirties. She dresses so nice, and her smile lights up any room she's in, and her voice is beautifully deep and rich, and she smells good, and her eyes are gentle and kind. Rupert gets tongue-tied around her, makes easily avoidable mistakes, bumps into things. Their eyes are always on Leah, except when Leah looks at them, then Rupert averts their gaze as quick as they can.

After two weeks of this, Rupert gathers all their courage and asks Leah if she wants to grab a coffee after work. Their heart is beating like they're running a marathon, and they're stuttering, and their hands are shaking, but Rupert manages it. The butterflies in their stomach are all making somersaults when Leah says yes.

"I'm not a man," is one of the first things that Rupert tells her when they're each holding a cup of coffee. "Does that bother you?"

Leah shakes her head.

"I'm not really into men," she says with a smile. "So if you were, I probably wouldn't be interested in you."

Rupert almost lets their cup slip from their fingers. _Interested...?_ Does that mean...?

"Oh," Rupert says, his chest full of warmth and hope. "Oh, okay."

They end up going back to Rupert's new place, and Rupert doesn't get much sleep that night. Leah is wonderful and soft and Rupert loves the taste of her, loves the little noises she makes, loves her smile, loves holding her, loves kissing her, loves loving her.

Leah calls them beautiful and pretty and gorgeous, and Rupert feels like they're about to burst with happiness. 

**

With Leah's help and encouragement, Rupert starts selling their art. It turns out that for some reason, there are people who are interested in buying pieces from their old stack of self-portraits and Carlas. Rupert doesn't really understand why anyone would be, but just shrugs and accepts this fact. They go through their old works: there are a handful they decide to keep, they see things in them now that weren't obvious to them while painting—a beauty in the shattered-ness of their soul, in the way the pieces of Rupert don't seem to fit together and yet do. Sometimes, looking at their old stuff, Rupert can't help but laugh, happy that they've come so far in understanding and accepting themself. They remember Carla fondly. Rupert still isn't sure whether they made the right choice, not contacting her, but the idea still feels like a step in the wrong direction. Maybe at another point in their life.

In their current works, Rupert still depicts themself sometimes, but very infrequently. They don't really have reason to: Rupert is happy with where they are in life, happy with their gender, happy with their soul. Now, the subject of their art is much more concerned with society, with injustice, with repression. Working with the activist group, Rupert has witnessed all sorts of violence against queer people; from small, seemingly innocuous daily occurrences to the time the police violently broke up one of their protest marches, injuring several of Rupert's friends in the process.

And then there's AIDS: still a growing threat, still untreatable, still causing more and more deaths every month. The grief and the anger find their way onto Rupert's canvasses, and for some reason, these are the pieces that sell best.

Rupert still draws AIDS victims for free, Rupert could not live with themself if they asked anyone to pay for these paintings. The more wealthy partners and friends of their subjects insist on giving Rupert donations for their work, however.

**

Rupert still doesn't know whether they want to take hormones or not. But as Miss Daisy likes to say: they're still so very young. There's no rush to figure this out, and Rupert will know what to do when the time is right.

For their twenty-fourth birthday, Rupert wears a pretty dress and a lot of sparkly make-up and all their friends are cramped into their apartment. It's wonderful in a way Rupert never would have imagined their life could be, back when they were living with their family. Miss Daisy sits in a corner and knits, Joan and Harriet are arguing about movies with Jay, the others are engrossed in a different conversation. Leah pulls Rupert aside and tells them she loves them, and Rupert's entire being glows with happiness.

Rupert can't wait to find out where life is yet going to take them—but for now, they are perfectly content to be where they are. To be _who_ they are. To be openly, unapologetically queer. Rupert kisses Leah and tells her they love her, too, and then the two of them rejoin the party, holding hands.


End file.
